After exiting the auto shop, Drew looked at the chief, "I was thinking we should head east and walk up the freeway, give the trolls a wide berth."
The chief nodded, "Same thing I was thinking."
"Why do you keep calling them trolls?" Jholie asked, "Aren't trolls supposed to be short and rock-like?"
Drew laughed, "You mean like the ones in Frozen? No, I guess I base most of my names on games that I've played. In most of those, trolls are immune to physical attacks or have super high regeneration that makes it almost impossible to kill them with physical attacks but they are vulnerable to fire and acid. The first trolls I killed seemed to take extra damage from fire, so I started calling them that."
"I think I liked the Frozen trolls better. We've been calling them green skins, and I think that's a pretty good name for them." Drew glanced at the chief, who had pulled ahead of them, and frowned. Jholie had the ability to create headaches in people, and he was pretty sure he understood what aspect of her personality had induced the system to give her that capability.
"Yeah, it'd be nice if we could all pick which enemies we find. But the...creatures that we had to fight in the bunker had green skin too. I called them orcs because they kind of looked like the orcs from my games. But they called themselves the Go'rai, which I think was like the name of the tribe they were from, and the whole race they called…" He paused, trying to remember the other name Chakri had called his people. "Nathzim? It was something like that."
Bill spoke from in front, "There was a prisoner that could understand the language they used to talk to each other. He said they called themselves the Ashalla. But we should probably be quiet, don't want to attract any monsters." Drew wasn't sure if that was true or if the chief just didn't want Jholie to talk more.
Jholie looked a little frightened at that and moved to catch up to the bigger man. Both had an Ashalla dagger at their side, and Bill also had a four-foot-long crowbar he must have picked up somewhere in the auto shop. The route they had decided on was about half a mile to the wall surrounding the base, from there it was another mile up the freeway to where they would jump the wall and get to the Coast Guard HQ, and then a final half mile from that point up to the exchange.
The first monsters they saw appeared suddenly as they came around a blind corner. There in a field to their right were several rabbits. Ranging in size from three to four feet long, they each had a nub of a horn on the top of their heads. The two biggest rabbits were using their horns to bash each other like goats fighting over a mate. The smaller rabbits sat about the field watching the two bash each other. In total, Drew saw more than two dozen rabbits all glowing with a red/green aura. Bill had come around the corner first and had held up a hand to stop them, while Jholie made an "Awww" sound.
Several of the rabbits turned to look at the group as they heard the noise, but none of them seemed interested in pursuing them. Drew pointed closer to the building away from the field and all three of them moved quietly over to that side, watching as the rabbits continued to bash each other silly in the middle of the field.
Once they were on the other side of the road and a few hundred feet away from the rabbits, Drew looked at them, "We're calling those things Bashers. They looked exactly like some monsters I read about in a book."
Bill looked at him strangely, "What sort of books do you read?"
They could see the wall now and headed towards it through the parking lot of the swimming pool. Drew was about to answer, but Jholie spoke instead, "I don't really read books, but I watched Perks of Being a Wallflower and that was based on a book, so it's like I read it. I also watched the Hunger Games movies and those are based around books too. I really miss movies; I was excited about the new Jungle Book movie--the live action one that was supposed to come out next month, that's going to be great. My friend Shea says..."
Drew and Bill both turned to stare at Jholie, who didn't seem to realize that they thought it odd how much she talked, then looked at each other and shook their heads slightly. Jholie kept talking, quietly enough that it wasn't really an issue, but Drew tuned her out, nodding and grunting whenever the girl paused. He was impressed with her energy, to be honest. She had probably just had her parents and most of her friends killed, and her world had been invaded by trolls, but right now she was talking about how much she loved Minions and Inside Out.
They made it to the wall without further incident and with Jholie only ceasing her constant flow of words for breath. "We need to be quiet up here, this is where I was attacked by the squirrels, and the trees are thick enough that there could easily be a couple hundred more of them. Bill, I'll help you over first, then you can help Jholie on the other side. I can get myself over." Both Drew and Bill looked at Jholie, who nodded her head, and pantomimed locking her lips and throwing away the key while Drew leaned against the wall, so Bill could use his legs, shoulders, and hands to climb over the wall.
Bill threw over his crowbar and then took the pre-offered boost up from Drew to scale the 8-foot wall with relative ease. Drew grunted while trying to push him up to make it easier. At the top of the wall, he looked around, "Looks clear." He said before dropping down to the other side of the fence. Jholie watched and then shook her head.
"I can't do that." She said with a frown.
"Sure you can, it'll be easy, and the chief will catch you on the other side," Drew said, interlocking his fingers together again to help.
"Come on over Jholie; it'll be fine." The chief said from the other side.
It took a few more minutes of cajoling before Jholie eventually made her first attempt. Drew had to push her over the top of the wall, but she managed to get up without too much effort. She only let out a small scream as she jumped off the wall into Bill's waiting arms. Drew backed away from the wall, and then with a running start activated gravitas, clearing the wall with ease and sailing over Bill and Jholie, and landing far more gracefully on the other side than his first attempt at the maneuver.
He turned around and realized that both were staring at him with impressed expressions. "Did you just jump over the wall?" Bill asked incredulously.
"That was soooo cool!" Jholie exclaimed.
Drew grinned back, "Yeah. Probably one of the most fun xatherite I have." He turned and began walking up the road, the other two moving to follow him.
Drew saw a few squirrels in the trees. He wasn't sure if it was due to the larger group or if they were leary of him having killed the pack that attacked him earlier, but they managed to get all the way to the hill leading up through HQ and to the exchange without being attacked. Jholie stayed quiet for most of the trip. About halfway there she had been looking tired enough that they took a short break while Drew cast refreshing rain. He also took the time to renew his protection spells.
The highway was relatively boring, but they were able to jump over a chain link fence and up a slight hill to get onto St. E's campus. They passed through the gap between the headquarters building and the parking lot. Drew pointed out where they had exited and watched cautiously but didn't see any Go'rai or wereghouls in the windows. The remains of the barricade looked like it hadn't been fixed yet either. Drew wondered if the manaborn respawned, and if they did, would Chakri become his nemesis like in Shadows of Mordor? He hoped not, because that had been a pain.
As they climbed, Drew looked up at the exchange where he'd last seen Katie and saw that the walls were still up. He had been hoping to catch a glimpse of the attractive brunette as they came back. He hoped she wasn't too mad that he was late.
Drew lead the others in his excitement to get back and get Sarah healed. As he went around the corner of the exchange towards the front door, he walked straight into what he could only call a swarm of hand-sized mosquitoes which glowed red to his mana sight. A quick fireball killed dozens of them, and he shouted a warning to Bill and Jholie. There were still many of the swarm left, and still more were being drawn in by the heat and light he'd just created.
He looked behind him and then blink stepped back 15 feet to be right in front of Bill, launching a frostfire ball towards the swarm that was now attacking his afterimage. A few dozen more died to the flames and others were caught by the flying ice, their wings shredded, causing them to smash against the floor, feebly attempting to return to the air. He raised his hands, waiting for the rest of the swarm to notice him, backing up slowly as the illusion bought them a few more seconds for fireball to recharge. When they came after him again he dual cast cone of frost and cone of frostfire, his arms spread wide to increase the coverage of the spells. The icy blast took out a large swath of the swarm, leaving only a dozen individuals that had been on the front edge where the cones hadn't expanded.
Drew ducked as one flew towards his head but heard the smack of the crowbar hitting it out of the air as Bill took a swing. Jholie was screaming and had curled up into a ball, waving her hands around her head to scare them away. Drew launched lightning bolts as fast as he could; he missed often, but Bill was doing serious damage with his crowbar.
Seeing one latch onto Jholie's back, Drew smacked it away with his hand. He could feel the proboscises break off inside the girl as he did, and her screaming became even louder. But the fight was mostly over at that point, and it only took a few more swings of Bill's crowbar to drive the rest of them away.
Drew stomped on a few of the still moving mosquitoes while Bill pulled the proboscis out of Jholie's back. She didn't stop screaming until he hugged her, at which point she broke down, crying hysterically. Drew didn't blame her; it was probably the first time she'd felt safe since the Advent began a week ago. He realized that she'd been hiding all the pain and fear underneath that thin veneer of normalcy her constant chatter had allowed.
Drew gave Jholie a minute while he walked towards the door, wondering what had gotten the mosquitoes to swarm there. The outer glass door had been broken open, and inside was what looked like a pure black, enlarged badger and several mosquito corpses. The insects had clearly drained it of blood as it had struggled and killed a few them, but the swarm had been far too much for it to handle.
He caught a bright red glow of mana from one of the mosquitos and realized there was the smallest xatherite crystal he had seen growing out of its back. He touched it, then with a very mild red glow, a blinking message appeared in the corner of his vision.
The summoned walls inside the exchange were gone, leaving a clear line of vision through the glass door to the back wall, and he could see glow stones spread around the place, but the bedding where he'd left Sarah was empty and there was no sign of Katie.